Iran: OPCW fact-finding mission in Syria not successful

FNA – Iran blasted the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW)’s fact-finding committee for unprofessional and unbalanced mission in Syria, stressing that its report is not creditable.

“The fact-finding committee has failed to embrace success in doing investigations within the framework of its responsibilities and based on the chemical weapons convention and its measures have been unprofessional, balanced and independent and therefore, the mechanism report also lacks credibility,” Deputy Head of Iran’s mission in the Hague for Legal and International Affairs Reza Pourmand Tehrani said, addressing the 56th meeting of the OPCW’s executive council.

He referred to the chemical attack in Syria’s Khan Sheikhoun and allegation against the Syrian government, and said that the claims have been made without any sampling from Shayrat airbase and this shows the baselessness of these allegations.

Tehrani reminded that Syria has accepted the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC) despite the hard conditions it faces and its fight against the terrorists groups.

Earlier this month, the Permanent Mission of Russia to the United Nations announced that report on the April chemical attack in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun looks more like an amateur document and is based mostly on assumptions and the selective use of facts.

Russia has conveyed to the United Nations its preliminary assessment of the report on the probe of the Joint Investigative Mechanism (JIM) of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW) and the United Nations into the April attack in the Syrian town of Khan Sheikhoun, the Permanent Mission of Russia to the United Nations said.

“Russia has distributed as an official document of the UN Security Council and General Assembly its preliminary assessment of the seventh report by the OPCW-UN Joint Mechanism on the investigation of cases chemical weapons’ use in Syria,” the mission said in a statement.

The report looks more like an amateur document and is based mostly on assumptions and the selective use of facts, the mission added.